A Polemical Iconography: the Magi from Orient
Patricia Grau-Dieckmann
Original title: Una Iconografía polémica: los Magos de Oriente
Published in Expressing the Divine: Language, Art and Mysticism
Keywords: Art, Epiphany, Iconography, Magic, Three Wise Men, Worship.
"… there came wise men from the east to Jerusalem" briefly informs Mathews Gospel about these illustrious visitors that - following a star - arrive from the east to worship Baby Jesus. He further tells that they fell on their knees and "presented him with gifts - gold, incense and myrrh". Later apocryphal tales and popular narratives beautify and adorn the legends about these mysterious characters. Very early does art reflect the iconography of the worship of the magi, known as "Epiphany". This scene will mutate through time and will develop into the sumptuous representation of the royal characters that became the Three Wise Men. Early Christian art may offer a key to the understanding of whom they were, what were they looking for and what were the reasons that justify the importance of the scene of the Epiphany within the frame of this new religion - Christianism - that tried to expand among the gentiles.
A Proposal for a Universal Science in Ars Brevis (1308) by Ramon Llull
Fabricia dos Santos GIUBERTI
Original title: A Proposta de uma Ciência Universal na Arte Breve (1308) de Ramon Llull
Published in Nicholas of Cusa in Dialogue
Keywords: Art, Medieval Philosophy, Ramon Llull, Science.
As a passionate follower of Ramon Llull, Nicolau de Cusa, had in his personal library, several works of Catalan philosopher. One version of Art Llull which had spread over the centuries following his death was the Art Brief (1308) precisely because it is a simplification of his proposals to create a universal science idea as to suit modern thought still in gestation. The purpose of this issue is to present the general structure of his art, as the Mallorcan went down to posterity as an original innovator of medieval proposals unification of all sciences.
Angelus or The touch of the Virgin: the Music in the Cantigas de Santa Maria (13th century) by King Alfonso X
Bárbara Dantas
Original title: Angelus ou O toque da Virgem: a Música nas Cantigas de Santa Maria (séc. XIII) do rei Afonso X
Published in Music in Middle Ages and Early Modernity
Keywords: Alfonso X, Architecture, Art, Cantigas de Santa María, Middle Ages, Music, Poetry.
Harmonious as a song, the Galician-Portuguese poetry, systematized by the zéjel metric, was the basis of the poetry of Cantigas de Santa Maria, a compilation that contains reports of miracles and praises to the Virgin performed in the second half of the 13th century at the request of the castilian king Alfonso X (1221-1284), creator, sponsor and supervisor of the work. In Cantigas, reality is overcome by imagination without limits and the relation of poetry with two other artistic forms (Music and image) makes it literary support in which the themes of the songs to the Virgin were formed. Music and image share with the poetry a sensitivity capable of expressing in different ways certain reports of miracles or praise. For this article, I present to you the Cantiga 276 of the Cantigas de Santa Maria. From iconographic and architectural analyzes, I realized the association between church bells, the architecture of the sanctuary towers where they are housed and the melody of the Angelus (The Virgin's Touch).
Apocryphal storie's influence on Medieval Art
Patricia Grau-Dieckmann
Original title: Influencia de las historias apócrifas en el Arte
Published in Mirabilia 1
Keywords: Apocryphal Gospels, Art, Canonical Gospels, Flight to Egypt, Iconography, Legends..
Christian art depicts scenes on the life cycles of Virgin Mary and Jesus that, even though they are familiar to our eyes, entail an iconographic content that does not strictly reflect the accounts of the Canonical Gospels. These scenes, although conceived in the Church's own bosom, are based on legends, apocryphal stories and oral traditions. Within this context we will consider works produced from the 5th to the 15th century and will analyze the way in which the Apocryphal Gospels and some orally transmitted traditional legends have conditioned the iconography of the Holy Family's Flight to Egypt.
Art and Medicine - An Optional Mutual Relationship
Georgia Dunes da Costa MACHADO
Original title: Arte y Medicina - Una Relación de Mutualismo Facultativo
Published in
Keywords: Art, History of Medicine, Interdisciplinarity, Medical Humanities, Transdisciplinarity.
As we evolve scientifically, we move away from the art involved in the intrinsic care of medicine. Many of our doctors are more blind, deaf, less tactile, devoid of empathy, as well as massacred by the high number of care they need to perform and the shameful conditions of work and service to which they are subjected and who are obliged to submit their patients. How can we not distance ourselves from models of behavior like that of William Osler (1849-1919)? This work presents different possibilities of using the arts as an example of a tool for reversing the proven loss of empathy of the medicine students. This through interventions in this process, as well as a reflection about the preconception of the hierarchy of knowledge and the feeling of unpreparedness of the faculty for the basic ability of mediation between art and medical-humanistic contents. It is possible, with the involvement of the emotion, as it happens with the musicians of an orchestra, to govern such mediation of an eye in the good final product: a new or old doctor that disturbs and surprises his patient, being a watershed in life of the individual who puts his full trust in him. In these terms, the use of the arts emerges as an important pedagogical resource, oriented to the rescue of the origins of Medicine, being the technologies and medical science incorporated for the benefit of the patient protagonist in a process of voluntary mutualism between medical art and medical science. This desire sums up in the phrases: “The curricular contents should teach not only the auscultation but the Listening; not only the palpation, but the Comfort to those who suffer; and not only to treat but to broaden the meaning of the act of caring”; “the worst man in science is he who is never an artist, and the worst artist is one who is never a man of science.”
Colors in the work of Nicholas of Cusa
Marica COSTIGLIOLO
Original title: I colori nell’opera di Niccolò Cusano
Published in Mirabilia Journal 31 (2020/2)
Keywords: Art, Colors, Middle Ages, Nicholas of Cusa, Perception.
When we think about colour and its meanings, we must consider the historical path that colours have gone through, and how they have changed over the course of history. Until the seventeenth century, those who dealt with the perception of colour mainly analyzed its nature, its organization in a system of relationships. From Newton onwards, the understanding of colour is analyzed starting from the relationship of the mechanisms of vision and perception. In Nicholas of Cusa work, we find both perspectives. On the one hand, Cusanus is interested in the mechanism of sight, on the other hand there are numerous metaphors with light and divine light. The philosopher's discourse therefore addresses both an analysis of the mechanism of perception and a broader discourse that becomes a theological and mystical metaphor. In this sense, his work proves to be a rich source also in the context of the history of colours and in general in the history of art.
Death as a character in popular culture through History
Ramón MÉNDEZ GONZÁLEZ
Original title: La Muerte como personaje de la cultura popular a lo largo de la Historia
Published in The World of Tradition
Keywords: Art, Culture, Death, History, Literature, Tradition.
Aside from being part of the cycle of life, Death itself became a very important character in popular culture. Since its first appearance as a Horseman during the Apocalypse, and until nowadays, the character of Death has showed different shapes and has inspired a huge array of sculptors, painters, writers, people of letters, composers, movie makers, illustrators and even video game developers. In each different era of human history, the representation of Death evolved to adapt itself to different idiosyncrasies and ways of understanding the world in each society, as well as the possibilities that technologies offered to these creators of art. The main goal of this paper is to give a brief overview of how the character of Death evolved since its origins to nowadays, through the image of the Western Death that was influenced by the Christian rituals and that became the main anthropomorphism of natural Death.
Graphic derision in Ancient Egypt
Manuel ÁLVAREZ JUNCO
Original title: Lúdica y burla gráfica en el Antiguo Egipto
Published in Mirabilia Journal 31 (2020/2)
Keywords: Art, Caricature, Egypt, Graphic derision, Iconography.
The hieratic image of the Egypt of the pharaoh’s art has its counterpart in a series of playful works and mocking graphic realizations that discover the transgressive side of this influential civilization. This research analyzes the meaning of images with parodies, caricatures and satirical figures as well as highlight the worship of some divinities of the playful and informal, which provide a counterpoint to the severe and strict culture of the Nile. It aims, in short, to be a reflective note on the sense of humour since ancient times.
Introduction: Art, Criticism and Mystic
Bento SILVA SANTOS
Original title: Apresentação: Arte, Crítica e Mística
Published in Art, Criticism and Mysticism
Keywords: Art, Criticism, Mystic.
Medical Humanities: Art and Life
Hélio ANGOTTI NETO
Original title: Humanidades Médicas: Arte e Vida
Published in
Keywords: Art, Bioethics, Medical Humanities, Organ Donation, René Favaloro.
This volume of Mirabilia / Medicinæ Journal brings three articles on Medical Humanities: Art and Life. The articles include an appreciation of art related to healthcare education, a biography of a renowned physician and an article on human life sacredness and the search for organs to donation. The three themes are intrinsically linked to the humanistic effort and offer different perspectives from a broad field of study.